Abusing his privileges

Two years ago, alarmed at violence spiraling out of control on Rikers Island, this Editorial Board called on Mayor de Blasio to fire Correction Commissioner Joe Ponte, writing:

“De Blasio is not in command on Rikers because Ponte is not in command on the scene.”

Who knew how literally true those words would prove to be?

A new report from the Department of Investigation reveals that Ponte was nowhere near New York City or its increasingly unhinged jails for 90 days in 2016 , having used his city-issued, only-for-official-business SUV to speed back to his home state of Maine.

One kept taking personal trips even after suffering a $1,500 fine from the city Conflicts of Interest Board — issued because city rules incontrovertibly and justifiably forbid personal trips in city vehicles, as every employee is informed when they pick up their car keys.

Ponte and crew thought they’d found a loophole, claiming that a phone call here and email there while on the road while supposedly on “24-hour call” meant they were working all along.

While their correction officer underlings toiled locked inside increasingly dangerous jails, around the clock, Ponte and crew escaped in their city-issued SUVs to green pastures.

Which meant Ponte failed to reckon, face to face, with the consequences of his poorly conceived and executed reforms intended to make incarceration kinder, notably the near-elimination of solitary confinement as a consequence for inmate misbehavior.

On one Friday last September, with Ponte well beyond city limits courtesy of his city car, hell broke loose: Two Rikers inmates attacked correction officers, angling to exit a new special anti-violence unit; another suffered a life-threatening razor gouge to the neck; and the Brooklyn House of Detention went on lockdown following a stream of slashings.

A commissioner’s job, at which Ponte has obviously failed, is to lead his department.

A mayor’s job is to lead his administration. Yet de Blasio Friday rushed to Ponte’s defense, whatevering: “He was advised, he followed that guidance, that guidance was wrong.”

Nonsense, says DOI Commissioner Mark Peters, who rightly retorts that “City Hall harms government integrity by even trying” to defend such indefensible conduct.

To rephrase our previous take: “Ponte is in command because de Blasio is not.”